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Obama taps Daniel Baer for ambassadorship

(Evan Vucci - AP)
President Obama on Monday named Daniel Baer, a former Georgetown professor and more recently deputy assistant secretary of state, to be ambassador to the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), based in Vienna.

Baer is one of as many as five openly gay ambassadors that Obama is expected to name in coming weeks, sources say.

The list includes HBO executive James Costos on tap to be named perhaps as early as this week. As we noted recently, Costos and his partner, decorator Michael Smith, bundled more than $1 million for the president’s reelection. Costos, already in the State Department’s training program (called “charm school”), is looking good for Madrid.

Former Office of Personnel Management director John Berry, as we reported in March, is the expected pick for Australia.

Rufus Gifford, former Democratic National Committee finance chairman and Obama’s 2012 fundraising director, is expected to be named soon to be ambassador to Denmark, we noted way back in February.

Another $1 million-plus bundler, James “Wally” Brewster, managing partner at SB&K Capital in Chicago, is also on tap for an overseas posting.

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